Seven-Factor Phrases, Scooby-Doo Factor, and Mindshare Competition

Bart Queen:  Welcome to the remarkability Institute podcast. This is Bart queen, your host. I'm really glad you're with us today. I recently had someone give me a call and ask me about the fear of public speaking and when I tried to address the issue with them. As I listened to him, he kept talking about all the things that he would naturally not do when he was standing in front of a group of people, and I laid out to him the idea that this is the issue that every single person faces when they think about public speaking.

If I can really write the script, I take the word public speaking out of our vocabulary. I really truly believe it puts just fear and uncomfortableness in people's hearts. So the question becomes for all of us who do any type of communicating, whether it's a small group, one-on-one, a large group, 5,050 or 500, how do we come across more naturally?

I think the best way to come across and their real natural sense is to take a mind shift from this idea of public speaking to just having a conversation. If you and I went to Starbucks and had a cup of coffee and we sat at one of those cushy kinds of chairs, and we're just going to chit chat and have coffee over something, we wouldn't even think twice about the way we're seated in a chair.

We wouldn't think twice about what we do with our hands. We would gesture and just have a conversation. Most likely, we would look at each other as we shared whatever we were talking about. But as soon as you say to someone, Bart, can you get up in front of the group and share with them what your department, your division or company has been doing for the last six months? All of a sudden, people shift in their minds from having a conversation seated to standing to feel like their public speaking and presenting. I think this is the biggest challenge. Every single one of us faces, and to get past that, we've got to do a different mind shift. Here's the first mind shift.

Last fall, I had an opportunity to spend six months in the Asia pack. One of the stops on my trip wasn't Singapore. Now, the package that the client put me up with was in a hotel called the Marina sands. I don't know if you've heard of this hotel. It's a beautiful hotel. It's almost a city within a city. It has absolutely everything, from shopping to casinos to a spa.

At the very top of this hotel is a platform, and when you're on the ground, and you look up, it looks like Noah's Ark kind of landed up there. Now, this hotel is made up of three towers, and across the towers is this platform. There's a pool; there's a place you can eat. It's just beautiful. Now I'm an early riser, so I like to get up in the morning, go to the very top and enjoy some coffee.

Now, as I'm enjoying my coffee, I'm reading USA today on the back page of the very first section, there was a small article about a black market organization, heisting men's kidneys. Now, according to the story, two men are out. They finished up work. They're going to go have a drink, glass of wine, a cup of coffee, whatever it may happen to be that's appropriate, and one says to the other, you know what?

I think I need to go up and get some emails done before the end of the day. The other gentlemen say, "Oh, I'm just going to hang out for a little while." According to the article, a beautiful woman approaches him and says, can I buy you a drink? And this guy, being a gentleman, says, why, of course. And they start the conversation.

Well, according to the story, the next thing that the man realizes is he wakes up in a bathtub full of ice with a small sign on the top that says, we've harvested one of your kidneys. You need to call nine one one immediately. Now. I had never heard this story before, and when I shared this story with folks, many people will go, well, Bart, I've heard that story before, Bart, I even saw a movie about this kind of an idea.

Now, if I were in a classroom situation, I'd say, how many of you have heard this story before? And many of them would raise their hand, yes.

I make the other point for those who raised their hand and said, no, they've never heard it. I tell them that most likely a break at lunch. When you go home tonight, you're going to say to a family member, a colleague. The story that I've just shared with you. Now, I don't know whether this story is true or not.

That's not why I shared the story. Some people say that somebody put it out on the internet and it just went viral. Again, my point is not whether it's true or it's not true. My point is this. For those of you who had heard it before you went, I remember this, and for those of you who hadn't heard it, you'll most likely go tell the story.

So here's the paradigm shift. I want every single one of us to take. As we think about talking to our customers, we talk to our clients as we're sharing information, as we're speaking in our teams, our units, or our divisions. The question in your mind should not be, how do I tell them more? I see this a lot from salespeople.

It's this idea of showing up and throw up. How do I throw as much information at these people as I possibly can, guys? Just from my experience out of coaching folks out of the last 20 years, I don't think that's the right perspective. I think the question we should ask ourselves is, how do I get people to remember more.

How do I get people to walk out of my meeting, out of my sales call, out of my talk, out of my presentation, out of my keynote speech, out of my podcast, whatever it may happen to be guys, and walk down the hall and see someone else and say, I was just in a short meeting with Bart, and these were the three things that he said.

How do I get that kind of retention and memorability into my conversations? To my presentations to my webcasts, to my zoom sessions, to my one on one conversations. In my mind, it comes back to just something very, very simple we need to get away from, how do I tell them more to how do I get them to remember more.

No. I think there are two ways that come to my mind right off the top of the bat that can help us do that. The first one is what I call a seven-factor phrase. Now, if you think about it, what is a seven-factor phrase? And most people will come back and say, Bart, that some type of a phrase that I have seven pieces to it.

That's what I typically hear, but let me ask a different question. How many times does someone have to hear something before they remember it? Now, moms, dads, think about how many times you have to say to your children, pick up your clothes. Go, do your homework. Don't do that. Take out the trash. It's more than once.

Most likely. I was always taught; it's three times you need to say something three times before it begins to stick in someone's mind. Guys, that's not correct. The actual number is seven. You have to say something seven times for it to begin to stick in someone's head. Now what I'm teaching with the MBA students at say, Duke University or NC state, their final for me is just a five-minute talk.

As we walk them through the skillsets and through this information at the end of the semester, each one gives a five-minute talk, and I will tell them in that five-minute talk, you have to have a seven-factor phrase. You have to say something seven times. They'll come back to me and say, Bart, there's no way in five minutes.

I can say one thing seven times, and I'll come back and say, if you don't say it seven times, you flunk. I put that much emphasis on it because I want them to grasp the power of what this does in the way that we communicate. It never fails. A student gets up, they do their five-mi...